Chicken and Ham. ✠
Draw, wash, and stuff a pair of young fowls. Cut enough large, thick slices of cold boiled ham to envelop these entirely, wrapping them up carefully, and winding a string about all, to prevent the ham from falling off. Put into your dripping-pan, with a little water to prevent scorching; dashing it over the meat lest it should dry and shrink. Invert a tin pan over all, and bake slowly for one hour and a quarter, if the fowls are small and tender—longer, if tough. Lift the cover from time to time to baste with the drippings—the more frequently as time wears on. Test the tenderness of the fowls, by sticking a fork through the ham into the breast. When done, undo the strings, lay the fowls in a hot dish, and the slices of ham about them. Stir into the dripping a little chopped parsley, a tablespoonful of browned flour wet in cold water; pepper, and let it boil up once. Pour some of it over the chickens—not enough to float the ham in the dish; serve the rest in a gravy-boat.
Roast Ducks.
Clean, wash, and wipe the ducks very carefully. To the usual dressing add a little sage (powdered or green), and a minced shallot. Stuff, and sew up as usual, reserving the giblets for the gravy. If they are tender, they will not require more than an hour to roast. Baste well. Skim the gravy before putting in the giblets and thickening. The giblets should be stewed in a very little water, then chopped fine, and added to the gravy in the dripping-pan, with a chopped shallot and a spoonful of browned flour.
Accompany with currant or grape jelly.
To Use up Cold Duck. ✠
I may say, as preface, that cold duck is in itself an excellent supper dish, or side dish, at a family dinner, and is often preferred to hot. If the duck has been cut into at all, divide neatly into joints, and slice the breast, laying slices of dressing about it. Garnish with lettuce or parsley, and eat with jelly.
But if a warm dish is desired, cut the meat from the bones and lay in a saucepan, with a little minced cold ham; pour on just enough water to cover it, and stir in a tablespoonful of butter. Cover, and heat gradually, until it is near boiling. Then add the gravy, diluted with a little hot water; a great spoonful of catsup, one of Worcestershire sauce, and one of currant or cranberry jelly, with a glass of wine and a tablespoonful of browned flour.
Or,
You may put the gravy, with a little hot water and a lump of butter, in a frying-pan, and when it is hot lay in the pieces of duck, and warm up quickly, stirring in at the last a teaspoonful of Worcestershire sauce and a tablespoonful of jelly.